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The long love affair between Minnie Miñoso, the first black player in White Sox history, and South Siders began with a bang in his first game with his new club. Traded as part of a three-team deal on April 30 that also involved the Athletics and the Indians,1 Miñoso, called by Chicago manager Paul Richards […]

“Brooklyn will be lucky to get a foul off me today. If Spoke [Cleveland player-manager Tris Speaker] and the boys will give me one run, Cleveland will win.” — Cleveland pitcher Duster Mails1   The Cleveland Indians’ starting pitcher in Game Six of the 1920 World Series, John Walter Mails, certainly did not have an […]

After winning their fourth division title in 1995, the Atlanta Braves were on a quest for their first World Series championship, having captured three division titles but losing two World Series in the first half of the decade. Their chances were looking optimistic after they defeated the Colorado Rockies in four games in the Division […]

The 1967 season remains a magic year in Boston baseball history. The Red Sox, ninth-place finishers in 1965 and ’66 and owners of a combined 499-624 record since 1960,1 won the American League pennant under new manager Dick Williams and took the World Series to seven games before falling to the St. Louis Cardinals. Their […]

Joe Horlen “turned the White Sox’s darkest hour into a glittering personal triumph,” gushed Chicago Tribune sportswriter Robert Markus after the right-hander’s stunning no-hitter against the Detroit Tigers.1 “[I]t was the biggest game, the toughest spot, the White Sox were in all season,” opined sportswriter George Cantor in the Detroit Free Press.2 The 1967 American […]

Game Three of the 1975 World Series featured six home runs and plenty of late-inning heroics, but the outcome turned on a bunt by a reserve outfielder with a .185 batting average. With five future Hall of Famers on the field (Johnny Bench, Carlton Fisk, Joe Morgan, Tony Pérez, Carl Yastrzemski) plus the all-time hit […]

Eddie Plank won 326 games in the major leagues – and a game in which he pitched 16 scoreless innings wasn’t one of them. That stretch of shutout pitching came in a game that went 19 innings and lasted more than four hours before the Athletics’ Hall of Fame lefty lost to another Hall of […]

After finishing July 1991 in second place in the National League East Division, the New York Mets went 8-21 in August and fell to fourth. Things didn’t improve in September, as they lost five in a row from September 4 to 9, including the opener of a two-game home series with the last-place Montreal Expos. […]

The Joe Cronin-managed Boston Red Sox held a six-game lead in the American League standings, with the New York Yankees in second place, and were 12 games ahead of the Cleveland Indians, whom they visited on May 22. It was a Wednesday afternoon at League Park. Indians player-manager Lou Boudreau started Mel Harder, a right-handed […]

 Boston’s Tris Speaker, described in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch as “the greatest center fielder playing the game today,”1 led the Red Sox in a 9-2 romp over the St. Louis Browns, as he hit for the cycle, collecting a single, double, triple and home run in the same game. The 1912 American League Bostonians were […]

As the baseball players’ strike got under way in June 1981, one touchy and undefined subject involved the prospect of minor-league teams playing games in vacant major-league ballparks. The Charleston Charlies and Tidewater Tides of the Triple-A International League drew national attention when players on both teams voted to reject a proposal by the Charlies’ […]

It was an eagerly anticipated matchup between opposite styles of play: Harvey’s Wallbangers and Whiteyball. Skipper Harvey Kuenn’s Milwaukee Brewers who led the majors in home runs (216), runs scored (891), and slugging (.455) against manager Whitey Herzog’s St. Louis Cardinals who paced the NL in stolen bases (200) and fielding (.981), while hitting the […]

At least the weather was pleasant: 80 degrees and a breeze made the prospect of a Sunday afternoon game palatable for the 22,325 fans in Nationals Park. As always, the fans were hoping for a win since no losing streak lasts forever. Coming into the game the Nationals’ (46-90) eight-game losing streak was the longest […]

Few multi-purpose stadiums in North American history can rival Toronto’s Exhibition Stadium for the number, variety and stature of events held there. Set in a vast fairgrounds complex on the shore of Lake Ontario, the municipal facility originally known as Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) Stadium served as the largest sports and entertainment venue in Canada’s […]

Referred to as “the original dirt player” by Atlanta Braves manager Bobby Cox, Mark Lemke was a throwback second baseman who rarely left the field with a clean uniform.1 Standing at 5-feet-10-inches and weighing between 165 and 170 pounds, the undersized second baseman contributed in ways that didn’t always show up in a box score. […]

Promise unfulfilled denotes the playing career of right-handed pitcher Mike Brown. When the Red Sox drafted the Clemson University star in the second round in the 1980 amateur draft, Boston Globe baseball writer Peter Gammons wrote that “two teams whose scouts I respect” considered Brown among the top 20 prospects in the country.1 But after […]

Dámaso Domingo (Sanchez) García, an 11-year major leaguer (1978-1989), began his career with the New York Yankees, but the second baseman-shortstop is best known for his seven seasons with the Toronto Blue Jays. His playing days ended with brief stints in Atlanta and Montreal. His final appearance with the Expos came on September 12, 1989. […]

On June 24, 1970, the Cleveland Indians were visiting New York to play a doubleheader against the Yankees. Tribe catcher Ray Fosse went 2-for-4 with one RBI, one run scored and one walk as Cleveland won the first game 7-2 behind Sam McDowell’s tenth win. Fosse was scheduled to sit out game two, but he […]

Billy Geer had a somewhat nomadic baseball career, playing parts of six major league seasons with seven different teams. That nomadic life would continue in his post-baseball career as he took up another profession that would keep him on the run for the rest of his life. William H. Geer was born about 1852 in […]

Pitcher Mike Prendergast toiled over 600 innings in back-to-back seasons with Peoria in the Illinois-Iowa-Indiana League. He followed that up with a 180-game major-league career. His work ethic earned him the nickname “Iron Mike,” but he would likely be long forgotten had he not been included in the Chicago Cubs-Philadelphia Phillies trade that sent Pete […]

Boston fans who liked the way Jason Varitek handles the Red Sox pitching staff would have loved Sammy White. Sammy, who was selected as an American League All-Star catcher in 1953, was the team’s number one catcher from 1952 to 1959. White was a credible hitter, averaging .264 during his eight full seasons with the […]

This article was originally published in “The First Negro League Champion: The 1920 Chicago American Giants” (SABR, 2022).   Rube Foster’s Chicago American Giants played home games at Schorling Park in Chicago (NoirTech Research, Inc.)   The arc of the history of the Chicago American Giants follows closely with the arc of Black and Negro […]

Robinson Canó’s single with the Diablos Rojos in the Mexican League playoffs on September 13, 2025, made him one of 23 players known to have recorded 4,000 career hits at all professional levels. (Courtesy of Prensa Diablos / Enrique Gutiérrez)   On Saturday, September 13, 2025, Robinson Canó stepped into the batter’s box at Estadio […]

Editor’s note: This article continues from Part 1, on the New York Giants team ownership from 1883 to 1957.   Stoneham the Younger The narrative of Giants ownership had changed abruptly and dramatically on January 6, 1936, when Charles A. Stoneham died of symptoms associated with Bright’s disease. The franchise immediately passed into the hands […]